Apartment building for wine connoisseurs unveiled in Tokyo

Have you always wished you had a bigger space in order to store all your vintage wines and have your friends come over for weekly wine-tasting parties? No? Well, if you’re one of the apparently growing market of wine connoisseurs in Japan, then your wish just came true as a new apartment block in Tokyo’s Shibuya district just opened up, and you’re its target market.

The Wine Apartment is an 18-unit, 10-floor property that houses a temperature and humidity-controlled basement that can hold 10,000 bottles of wine is now available for wine lovers to move in to. Each unit is around 42 to 46 square meters with a monthly rent of 239,000 yen to 258,000 yen (approx. $2,400 to $2,600), which is 30% more expensive than the rest of the apartments in the Shibuya area. But it is targeting a very specific market, as each apartment comes with its own wine fridge that can fit up to 26 bottles and has an accompanying wine glass rack. Aside from the monthly rent, tenants would also have to shell out a monthly storage fee of 20,000 yen ($200) to put up to 300 bottles in the wine cellar, and if that is not enough, you can pay an additional price for even more space.

During the weekends, a sommelier will be visiting the property and give the tenants advice on what food will best go with certain wines. He or she can also be hired by the hour if the residents will be having any gatherings. According to Takayuki Suzuki, the president of property developer Inovv Inc., the city of Tokyo is a thriving and unique market for wine connoisseurs and so he has seen the vast potential for an apartment like this. And he may be right, as 70% of the units have already been taken, with a popular bistro opening a branch on the first floor of the property.

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